I’ve started to notice a subtle shift in the atmosphere the last few years, and lately I think it’s starting to build momentum.

What am I talking about? Well, I think there’s a very strong undercurrent of Christians who are starting to question the status quo. Whether that’s asking questions about the traditional views of the afterlife, or the nature of God, or the atonement, or even the way we should relate to the Bible, pretty much everything that can be questioned is being reevaluated.

I think this is a pretty great thing, by the way.

I can understand that some evangelical pastors might be terrified at the idea of a more skeptical and discerning congregation in their pews, but this is not only necessary, it is inevitable.

Why has this phenomenon been growing? Mostly because of the internet, to be honest. In the same way that the invention of the printing press fueled the spread of the Gospel a few hundred years ago, the internet has revolutionized the spread of ideas and exponentially accelerated this new reformation of faith.

So, for example, without the internet it would take an entire generation, at least, for one new idea or differing perspective on the end times, or the character of God, or anything else, to spread across the landscape. But with the internet, ideas and questions about theology are not wide open and flying through the ether like flashes of lightning every few seconds.

Sure, not everyone responds to these new ideas with an open mind. Many want to hold tight to their doctrines and warn everyone not to be “deceived” by the “false teachers” and “heretics” that threaten to undermine decades of traditional theology. For a few, those warnings and that fear tactic actually works. But for a whole lot more people, those warnings are ignored. Instead of running from these new ideas in fear, they excitedly embrace these different perspectives, or at least take time to consider what others have to say.

Often, what happens is that people hear a new idea or concept that confirms something they’ve secretly believed or wondered about for years, but they were just too terrified to ask their pastor, or to say what they were thinking out loud – for fear of being shouted down, labeled a heretic, or asked to leave their church. (All of which are actual reactions that many of my friends online have experienced first-hand).

So, the internet has become a relatively safe place for people to investigate new theologies, entertain different theories, and ask all the questions they could never say out loud in church.

For example, I co-host a podcast called the Heretic Happy Hour. We came up with the name of the podcast as a joke. Mostly because all three of us who co-host the podcast have been called “heretic” or “false teacher” so many times it has lost all meaning. In fact, the terms really mean nothing other than: “You believe a few things that are different from my beliefs and therefore you are a heretic.” But what people fail to realize is that, while I might be their heretic, they are probably someone else’s heretic. In other words: Everyone is someone’s heretic.

Anyway, as part of our podcast, we host a private Facebook group for our listeners to freely post and share and question all the different theologies and doctrines they grew up with. What’s really fascinating is how many actual full-time pastors are in our group. Many of them will post things like: “I’ve got to preach a sermon this Sunday and no one at my church knows I’m a heretic.”

So, even while some people may appear to be towing the doctrinal line from the pulpit, many Christian pastors are secretly doubting some of their own church theology and they are wrestling with whether to come clean – and possibly lose their jobs – or continue to fake it every week – and slowly die inside because they realize they are leading people down a path that they themselves have already wandered away from.

Not everyone who questions their faith is winding up in the same spot. Some are abandoning Eternal Suffering to embrace Annihilationism, or Patristic Universalism. Still others are turning from Penal Substitionary Atonement theory to follow Christus Victor or Ransom Theory. And even more people are deciding to just chuck the entire Christian brand to simply follow Jesus in their actual lives.

To be fair, some are totally walking away from their faith, and from Jesus, completely. That’s sad to me. But at the same time, we’re running into people who have already left the faith years ago and who are now finding the faith to return to Christ, even if they still reject everything with the word “Christian” on it.

Some might say that this movement is dangerous, or misguided. For certain there are really no masterminds at the controls who are guiding the process or driving the message. This truly appears to be a genuine move of the Holy Spirit – at least to me.

Yes, there are a few authors and bloggers and teachers out there who are influencing this movement, whether they realize it or not. You probably know who they are without my dropping any names. But their names are not what’s important. What is really important is that the Holy Spirit is calling people out of religious mortification and into vibrant Christlikeness and the freedom of knowing God without fear or the control of institutions.

This is truly a good thing, my friends. I’m just thrilled to see this movement unfolding before my eyes. I’m excited about a move of God that invites everyone and anyone to know Christ without religion, or politics, or doctrines, or fear or control.

A movement led by the Spirit of God, that no man or woman can get their hands on, is a beautiful and necessary thing.

It’s also inevitable. So, those who try to fight against it are trying to hold back the ocean with a feather.

Ready or not, here it comes.

**

Keith Giles is a former pastor who left the pulpit 11 years ago to start a church that gives away 100% of the offering to the poor in their community.

Keith, I am encouraged that our physical sciences have developed to where we can communicate with each other around the world so very quickly through invisible (to the senses of the flesh) mediums. I am frustrated how inadequate our social and spiritual sciences have developed to allow each member of mankind to be discerning of the truth shared.

We have many movements, of many concerns, pointing in many different and conflicting directions, too often leading others to destructive conclusions. This is true of all conflicting tribes within the single body of mankind, which include the numerous separate sects within all the institutionalized Christian, Muslim, and Jewish, derived from Abraham, religious bodies demanding pledges of patriotism for their sole authority rather than leading each subscriber to honor the unifying authority of God only.

This, too, is true and as destructive for all nations of this world demanding patriotism for themselves rather than considering what is best for the future of all of mankind.

Without each member accepting the responsibility to utilize all the bountiful resources of communication and research available to most of us today, in a responsible discerning manner, we build armies through those mediums made up of blind members accepting tradition over truth, fiction over fact, at war, too often to the death, with one another.

The resources are more available than ever before for us to offer the Good News to each of all nations that they might join in the unified diversity, bound in all love, that is God. I trust wholly that my Father’s will does prevail over mankind’s self-centered enemies who utilize coercion, intimidation, manipulation and subjugation to distract from his available love.

Thank you!

The Mouse Avenger

This is a very wonderful article that I really loved reading! ^_^ Thanks so much for sharing it! 🙂

Al Cruise

“This truly appears to be a genuine move of the Holy Spirit – at least to me.” I agree . One of the real give away’s that this is Holy Spirit led is in the manner how you describe it is happening , quietly in the hearts of individuals absent from the grandstanding and control of human institutions.

jekylldoc

I’m kind of surprised that many pastors feel their heresy is a threat. First, I would have thought they went through that trouble in Divinity school. Which means their school failed. But I guess I knew many theological departments failed to encourage thinking. The real problem, though, is that they didn’t get the real structure to our faith, and the connections to the old time religion, that would allow them to preach their faith and not their doubts.

Okay, demythologizing religion, and using language for mythos (i.e. post-modernism) are too challenging for a lot of churches to take on board. And there are many congregants who want to be told, week in and week out, that they go to all the trouble to live right because they get to go to heaven afterward. But really, is it so difficult to use language figuratively and still inspire straight-up faith in Jesus? Jesus has such good things to share with us. Ransom and Christus Victor work well. And we still need to take the beam out of our own eye before we peer into our neighbor’s eye. Love is still patient and kind. Forbearing one another and forgiving one another have not stopped being important.

No, I am hoping to understand. I have come through a long process of re-thinking, without the pressure to preach a sermon each week and talk to congregants about matters of faith. So I understand I am not really in a position to get what these faith leaders are facing. But Jesus’s alternative is so much more appealing than the Old Time Religion, I am surprised to hear that people feel it difficult to work out of that paradigm.